Just before Christmas Heidi (my new Fiancee – not that there was an old one you understand!) and I visited Mottisfont Abbey for a crisp, wintery stroll around the gardens to see the ‘Stargazing’ sculptural trail that they’ve got on there until the 27th of this month. There is also an undercover exhibition inside the house called,‘New Directions in Contemporary Craft’ in case of rain!

The grounds of Mottisfont are really lovely and the trail is a great way to invite people to give themselves a guided tour. The best thing for me is that it encourages people to actually use their eyes to search out the various sculptures. While some are hard to miss others are a little more tucked away. Here’s my favourite…

One of the other attractions to wonder at in the grounds of Mottisfont is a huge London Plane tree. Reputed to be the largest specimen in the country, it is very impressive indeed, even viewed as we did in its winter state of undress.

Believed to date from the early 18th century, in 1990 the Mottisfont Plane was measured at 40m tall with a massive girth of 12m and the area covered by its branches a whopping 1500m2.

Both the stargazing sculptural trail and the Contemporary Craft exhibition run until the 27th of January. The Great Plane will be there for many years to come!